Ethiopian families gather in Oakland to celebrate the Coptic Christian holiday of Meskel

Ethiopian families from all over the Bay Area celebrated Meskel, an important Coptic Christian holiday, on Sunday.

Hundreds of Ethiopian immigrants and their families from around the Bay Area gathered at the Ethiopian Orthodox Cathedral on Mountain Boulevard Sunday for Meskel, or the finding of the True Cross, one of the most important holidays in the Coptic Christian calendar and a national holiday in Ethiopia. Wearing snow-white linen, worshippers congregated outside the church for much of the day while others prepared food which filled the air with the aromas of East African spices, turning the church parking lot into a scene out of their home country.

“In Ethiopia, no one misses Meskel,” said Rebecca Bekele, an Ethiopian immigrant who came for the day from Fremont. “We’re used to gathering and celebrating in this manner, so it really reconnects us to our country and our church.”

The Coptic sect is one of the oldest Christian sects in the world, with most followers living in Egypt, Ethiopia and Eritrea, and Meskel is one of its most revered holy days. The origins of the occasion stretch back to the fourth century AD, when Saint Helena, mother of Constantine, the first Christian Emperor of Rome, is said to have lit a bundle of wood and used the smoke to guide her to the location of the True Cross upon which Jesus Christ was crucified.